Pamela Atkinson is a local Mother Teresa who serves in the obscurity of homeless camps.
Before she retired, Atkinson spent her days as a corporate executive and her evenings helping the homeless. Today, Atkinson is available to help full time. She has met with the governor of Utah dressed in blue jeans on her way to feed the hungry and clothe the needy. Because dogs are the only companions for many, she brings food for their dogs.
The people Atkinson serves are the people many of us look away from when we meet them on the street. Not Atkinson. She refers to them as her friends.
At the soup kitchen, Atkinson stands at the front of the line and shakes hands with hundreds of people who will be fed that night. One man looked at her with tears in his eyes as she took his hand; it was the first time someone had touched him in more than a year. Soup is for their stomachs. Handshakes feed their souls.
Atkinson developed tennis elbow from shaking hands. Her doctor advised her to stop, but she explained her mission is bigger than tennis elbow. Today she wears a bandage on her elbow and is still shaking hands.
Atkinson gives all the glory to God, explaining she could never do it on her own.
Jesus washed the disciples' feet in the anonymity of an upper room. No audience. No fans. Just some grimy feet and a washbowl. Only the men, whose feet he knelt before, were present. Jesus received no adulation from a crowd, no personal glorification.
Jesus taught by example. He performed menial tasks with humility and was other-centered, not self-serving.
Chris Karcher is the author of "Relationships of Grace" and "Amazing Things I Know About You." She can be reached at www.relationshipsofgrace.com.
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